Pirate Bay is under (DDoS) attack! Torrent site remains down after 24 hours

The Pirate Bay is currently experiencing a massive distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, which has caused the site to remain inaccessible for the last 24 hours, reports TorrentFreak.

Members of The Pirate Bay confirmed the news with an update on their Facebook page, saying “We don’t know who’s behind it but we have our suspicions.” The group added, “We believe in the open and free Internets, where anyone can express their views. Even if we strongly disagree with them and even if they hate us. So don’t fight them using their ugly methods. DDOS and blocks are both forms of censorship.”

The Pirate Bay provides users with a way to find torrent files for software, movies, games, music, and more, which are usually being shared illegally. The site has become a symbol for piracy by both authorities and Internet users alike, despite its recent decision to stop hosting actual torrent files on its servers in favor of offering “magnet links.” These are links that take you outside the website to download your content.

So, who is to blame for the attacks? Well, there are two obvious suspects that would have a motive to shut the site down. The first of which is hacktivist group Anonymous, which The Pirate Bay criticized for the group’s role in DDoS attacks on Virgin Media last week. Anonymous’ attack on Virgin Media was a direct response to the Internet service provider’s decision to comply with a U.K. court order to block The Pirate Bay from its subscribers.

But while The Pirate Bay may not have condoned the actions of Anonymous, I find it pretty hard to believe that the group would collectively decide to punish them. The Pirate Bay — as well as its Swedish founders — embodies the piracy/anti-censorship movement. I also rule out copyright holders, who wouldn’t want to risk jeopardizing credibility in lawsuits against those accused of piracy or malicious online actions against them.

The more likely culprit for these attacks would be a governmental authoritative body working undercover. Now, obviously DDoS attacks wouldn’t seriously wound The Pirate Bay in any long-term sense — its users are far more resilient than that. However, authorities may be waiting to track Pirate Bay users that access the torrent site using unsecured proxies or other methods. Likewise, Pirate Bay members have warned people to use proxies at their own risk, and not to login to the site unless they absolutely trust the proxy supplier.